Gillian Cowlishaw facts for kids

Gillian Cowlishaw (born 1934) is an anthropologist from New Zealand. She is well-known for her studies of Indigenous Australians, also called Aboriginal Australians. An anthropologist is a scientist who studies human societies and cultures.

Gillian Cowlishaw's Early Life

Gillian Cowlishaw was born in 1934 in Otakiri, a rural area in New Zealand. She grew up on a dairy farm with her three brothers and sisters. She went to Otakiri School and then high school in Whakatane.

When she was 17, Gillian moved to Auckland. There, she studied to become a teacher at the Auckland Teachers' Training College. After finishing her studies and teaching for a year in a country school, she decided to travel. She visited Italy, worked in Hamburg, Germany, and lived in London for 18 months. She then returned to New Zealand, traveling through the Soviet Union and China.

Gillian later married an English scientist. They lived in different cities like Sydney and Adelaide in Australia, and also in Singapore. She eventually returned to Sydney with her two children.

Her University Studies

In 1970, Gillian started studying again at the University of Sydney. She was a "mature age student," meaning she was older than most students starting university. She studied psychology and anthropology. In 1974, she earned her Bachelor of Arts degree with honors in anthropology.

She continued her studies to get a PhD in anthropology. Her research focused on the lives of Aboriginal Australian women. To do this, she lived in southern Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory of Australia. This is called "field work," where researchers live among the people they are studying. She finished her PhD in 1979.

After her PhD, Gillian taught at several universities. These included Charles Sturt University, Australian National University, and the University of Sydney. From 1998 to 2005, she was a research professor at the University of Technology Sydney. Later, she returned to the University of Sydney.

Gillian's Career and Research

Gillian Cowlishaw's main work as an anthropologist was studying Aboriginal Australians. She looked closely at their local cultures and histories. She also studied the relationships between the original Indigenous peoples and the people who settled in Australia later.

Gillian also helped different government and community groups. For example, she wrote a report in 1990 for the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody. This was a special investigation into why Aboriginal people were dying in police custody. She also wrote reports for Aboriginal legal services and land councils.

From 1991 to 2001, she was an editor for a journal called Oceania. A journal is a magazine that publishes academic articles. From 2006 to 2008, she was the president of the Australian Anthropological Society.

Books by Gillian Cowlishaw

Gillian Cowlishaw has written several important books about her research:

• Black, White or Brindle: race in rural Australia (1988)
• Rednecks, Eggheads and Blackfellas: racial power and intimacy in north Australia (1999)
• Blackfellas, Whitefellas and the Hidden Injuries of Race (2004) - This book won an award.
• The City's Outback (2009)

Awards and Recognition

Gillian Cowlishaw's book Blackfellas, Whitefellas and the Hidden Injuries of Race won the New South Wales Premier's Award in 2005. It also won the Gleebooks Prize for Critical Writing.

In 2006, the Australian Research Council gave Gillian a special award called an Australian Professorial Fellowship. This award helped her research urban Aboriginal people living in the western suburbs of Sydney.

In 2013, she was chosen as a Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia. This is a great honor for people who have done important work in social sciences.

Personal Life

Gillian Cowlishaw was first married to Brian Cowlishaw. In 1991, she married Hal Wootten, who was a well-known lawyer and judge. Hal Wootten passed away in 2021.